The present invention relates in general to racks, and, more particularly, to knockdown racks.
Storage and shipment racks are commonly used in many industries, and especially the automative industry. Examples of such racks are disclosed in U.S. Pat. Nos. 2,746,176, 2,877,602, 3,022,896, 4,010,849 and 4,098,409. Some form of skid is also used in many industries, and examples of such skids are disclosed in U.S. Pat. Nos. 2,817,304 and 2,828,931.
However, the known racks and skids are not universally applicable to both functions as well as to use with a wide variety of items, or a wide variety of shapes and/or sizes of items. Thus, some racks will accommodate long items, while other racks will accommodate small items, or the like. Due to the difficulty of assembly and/or disassembly of known devices, these devices are not easily modified to accommodate such a wide variety of shapes and sizes. Furthermore, the size of most known devices is not readily altered.
A further drawback to known devices is the inability of a rack or skid to serve easily as the other device, that is, known racks are not easily modified to be skids, and vice versa. Such a drawback produces added costs due to a requirement of extra equipment, as well as labor costs involved in transferring items from a rack to a skid, and/or vice versa.
Yet a further drawback to presently known racks is the difficulty required in assembling and disassembling such racks. Special tools and skills are often required. Thus, a damaged rack may prove to be quite expensive, even if the damage is slight. Furthermore, due to the difficulty of assembling and/or disassembling such known racks, such racks are generally returned to a shipper in an assembled configuration. This presents numerous problems in space, cost, and the like. As such, return of shipping racks presents a serious problem and drawback to known racks. Such problems inhibit the use of such racks. In addition to this, most known racks are quite heavy and bulky and thus the shipping problems are further exacerbated.
Furthermore, damaged rack parts are generally discarded due to the difficulties involved in assembling and disassembling known racks, and due to the non-adaptability of these known racks. Discarding components that are only slightly damaged, but still perfectly serviceable, can considerably increase costs involved, and represents an unnecessary cost factor.
For the above reasons, known racks and skids have drawbacks that seriously inhibit the use thereof in a universal manner.